


Serbian Profanity for Fun and Profit (Tennis Edition)

by polkadot



Category: Tennis RPF
Genre: Banter, Copious Amounts of Profanity, M/M, Male Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-24
Updated: 2013-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-05 22:05:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1099117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polkadot/pseuds/polkadot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Dude,” Andy is saying, almost before Novak picks up the phone, “did you really tell the crowd to suck your dick?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Serbian Profanity for Fun and Profit (Tennis Edition)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [blindmadness](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blindmadness/gifts).



> I owe an eternal debt of gratitude to a dear anonymous Serb-picker who helped me with the profanity. Any remaining mistakes are due to Andy being a bad student. ;)

_madrid, 2013_

“Dude,” Andy is saying, almost before Novak picks up the phone, “did you really tell the crowd to suck your dick?”

Novak groans and throws an arm over his face, even though Andy isn’t there to see it. “Shut up. Oh, and also, shut up.”

Andy sounds about as amused as it’s possible for a laconic gruff Scotsman to be. Which is to say, very amused indeed, because everyone who thinks about him like that didn’t grow up with him. He has the loudest giggle of anyone Novak knows, and Novak’s friends with Viktor Troicki. 

“Seriously,” he’s saying now, and Novak can hear the grin on his face, “you didn’t even get a _code violation_.”

“Yes, well,” Novak says, rolling over on his stomach so he can rest his forehead on the pillow, “guess you’re regretting all those times I offered to teach you some Serbian and you threw things at my head.”

“Like you would have taught me ‘suck my dick’,” Andy says. “No, wait, I take that back, that’s exactly what you would have taught me.”

Novak laughs, temporarily distracted from the humiliating loss to Pretty McPrettyFace. “Probably would have taught you ‘I have a small dick’ and _told_ you it was ‘suck my dick’, but yeah.”

“Oh, thanks.”

“Stay away from Janko unless you want much worse,” Novak advises, because Novak’s the only person allowed to make Andy cry.

“If I started swearing in Serbian, I’m not really sure what the papers would say, but it wouldn’t be pretty.”

“Please,” Novak says, “like you could even get your mouth around the words.”

Andy’s grinning again, he can tell. “Then you’ll have to teach me. Forfeit for me going further in a clay tournament than you.”

“Rub it in, why don’t you,” Novak says, sulkily, frowning into the darkness. Jelena tried to cheer him up earlier – she’s a dear girl, and far too nice to be his friend – but he’s not in the mood to be cheered up. “I hope Simon thrashes you.”

Of the three Serbs in Madrid, only Viktor won a match, and he’s just gone out to Nishikori in the second round. This is embarrassing. Not a big deal in the broader picture, Novak knows – Rome’s just around the corner, and Roland Garros is the one he really cares about, after all – but embarrassing nonetheless. And he’d so wanted to back up that win in Monte Carlo, before Rafa gets entirely too big for his boots. (Novak thinks that’s the English expression, anyway.)

“We’ll see,” Andy says, but he doesn’t sound properly scared at the prospect of a Gilles Simon thrashing. “Anyway, I’ll try to get a swing in at Rafa for you.”

Andy’s always known what Novak’s thinking. It worries Novak at times. 

“C’mon, pony up,” Andy says, impatiently. “And teach me ‘kiss my arse’ while you’re at it.”

Andy’s a hopeless student. When Jelena comes in to tell him she’s made dinner, Novak’s almost crying with laughter. She rolls her eyes and leaves the door open so he’ll be lured out by the smell, but he sees her relieved smile. He’s really not that much fun when he’s frustrated, he thinks guiltily. He should try to set her up with Viktor to make up for it. Or perhaps Dusan.

“Sad setay koorack,” Andy starts again, with perhaps the worst accent Novak’s ever heard.

Novak snorts into his pillow, helplessly.

“Well, fuck you then,” Andy says, but he’s laughing too.

~

_rome, 2013_

“Zdravo, govnar,” Andy says, cheerfully, slinging an arm around Novak’s shoulders.

Viktor freezes.

Novak leans his head back against Andy’s shoulder. “Don’t tell me, you found Google.”

“You’d be amazed at what comes up when you look for Serbian cursewords,” Andy agrees. To Viktor, he adds, “You guys are really creative.”

Viktor says, tentatively, “Thanks.” 

“Don’t thank him,” Novak tells Viktor, because Viktor is too gullible to live. “And you,” he adds, driving an elbow backwards into Andy’s stomach, hard enough to make him yowl in fake pain, “shut up.”

“Supak!” Andy says, falling onto the bench and rubbing at his stomach, but he’s laughing.

~

_roland garros, 2013_

“Hey you,” JJ says, dropping into the seat across from Novak in the players’ cafeteria. She looks like she’s just come from a practice session, her hair still drying from the showers, her face glowing.

Novak’s smile feels like it’s a bit too wide, but he’s flying high after a dominant performance (6-2 6-0 6-2, oh how sweet that is), so perhaps he’s entitled to wide smiles at the moment. “Hey.”

JJ steals one of his carrot sticks. “So is there a reason your boy Murray called me to ask if I knew any dirty jokes in Serbian?”

Novak blinks. “What?”

“You heard me,” JJ tells him, stealing another carrot stick and pointing it accusingly at him. “Are you trying to set him up with Ana? Because I think she has her eye on that basketball player, and I know Murray’s your friend and all, but his body is nowhere near as good as that dude’s.”

“Why would I send Andy to you to learn dirty jokes if I wanted to set him up with Ana?” Novak asks, bewildered. “Even if I thought that would work, I’d just teach him some myself.”

JJ fixes him with an unimpressed look. “Whatever. I’ve never been able to understand you two.”

“Did you hang up on him?”

JJ grins. “No, I taught him the worst jokes I knew.”

~

“Dirty jokes, huh?”

“Are you calling because you want me to tell you one?” Andy asks, his voice as flat as ever. 

Novak’s missed that voice, even though its owner has only been off the tour for a little while. He finds himself smiling, and bites his lip to hold in a laugh. 

“No ‘how have you been, Andy’ or ‘how’s the back, Andy’ or ‘how can I distract you from being fucking bored, Andy’, just ‘tell me a dirty joke, Andy?’ You’re nice.”

“I’m not a nice person,” Novak says, and doesn’t manage to hold back the laugh this time.

“You can say that again,” Andy tells him, but the grumpiness is just for show. Novak’s not sure how he knows that, he just does. You get to know things about a guy when you’ve been best friends since you were teenagers. 

“I would’ve told you dirty jokes if you’d asked,” he says.

Andy snorts. “I know. But you’re too busy conquering Roland Garros and setting up your semifinal date with Rafa. So I’m getting tips from everyone.”

“Everyone?” Novak asks, beginning to feel just the faintest bit worried. 

“Everyone,” Andy confirms, and Novak can hear the grin. “Not much else to do when I can’t practice. I’ll be speaking fluent Serbian in no time.”

Novak’s not sure if he’s more amused or terrified at the thought.

~

They’ve left Novak alone.

He’d fought so hard. He’d been so close. If he’d got through Rafa he knows he could have won, could have fallen to his knees and rolled in the Parisian clay, could have kissed the _Coupe des Mousquetaires_ and lifted it over his head in triumph. It’s the last thing he has left to win, besides Olympic gold, the last thing and the hardest, because the road goes through Rafa and Rafa’s a hell of a roadblock. Novak had hoped after Monte Carlo… but it wasn’t to be.

His phone rings. Novak doesn’t answer it. He doesn’t want to talk to people.

Just a few months ago, he’d felt like he was on top of the world. He’d won the Australian Open again, beating Andy in a good match, and everything had been perfect. With Roger getting steadily older and less consistent, Rafa out since Wimbledon with his perennial (and apparently worsening) knee problems, and nobody else really able to challenge them, it had seemed like he and Andy were the top two for years to come, kings of the mountain and lords of the realm.

And then Rafa…

It’s really not fair. Not fair for Rafa to go away for seven months, give them a glimpse of a world after him, and then come back as some sort of unbeatable god. Monte Carlo aside – because that was a dream day, and if Novak has to play that well to have a hope of beating him, Novak’s pretty much fucked – Rafa’s been winning _everything_. Maybe on grass and hardcourt he’ll become mortal again, but Novak just finished throwing everything in his body onto the court only to come up short, and he’s not sure he has anything more to give.

His phone buzzes with a new text.

**picko jedna tvrdoglava**

_You tenacious cunt_ , Novak repeats to himself, hearing the words in Andy’s flat voice, the tinge of admiration hidden behind the casual profanity.

He calls Andy back. 

“Talk to me,” he says, before Andy has time to say anything. “Just…talk to me.”

Andy’s quiet for a minute, and then he starts in on the current sorry state of British football, before moving on to upcoming prizefighting bouts. He doesn’t ask questions, and he doesn’t make Novak talk; they’ve both been here before, sometimes at the hands of each other, and Novak hangs on to the phone and listens, shutting his eyes and just focusing on Andy’s voice.

It’s enough. For now, it’s enough.

~

“Zdravo, govnar.” 

It’s Andy’s usual greeting now, accompanied with a casually affectionate arm around Novak’s shoulders. Novak’s response is just as ritual. “Puši kurac.”

“You two are _so weird_ ,” Janko says under his breath, as he crosses the locker room behind them.

Novak and Andy share a grin. They know.

“So Zimonjic taught me this Serbian dick joke about the number 8,” Andy starts, dropping his arm from Novak’s shoulders and starting back towards his locker.

Novak shoves his stuff into his own locker, grabs his racquet bag, and follows. “Go on,” he says.

Andy does.

~

Novak always says that it took five hundred propositions for Andy to realise he was serious.

Andy always says that he started the profanity thing to get Novak in bed in the first place.

Perhaps they’re both right.

For once Novak doesn’t care too much about who’s the winner and the who’s the loser, since what really matters is that Andy is finally taking him up on that Madrid suggestion on a regular basis. 

And it’s glorious.

~


End file.
